A Problem of Status ‐‐ Teacher Training in West Germany

Abstract

West Germany presents a varied and constantly changing pattern. Basically however, it can be divided into three main types according to the status of the establishment concerned. In Hamburg, for instance, by long tradition, students studying for entry to the elementary school are enrolled in the faculty of philosophy and have, broadly speaking, the same rights and privileges as all other university students. In Hesse and Bavaria on the other hand although students are enrolled at the university, they are first and foremost students of the Pddagogische Hochschule (Training College) or Hochschule fiir Erziehung (College of Education) in Hesse. These latter have a largely autonomous constitution, as they do not come within any faculty, and indeed organizationally they hold a position midway between a faculty and a fully independent Pddagogische Hochschule. (1) Moreover, physically they are also often far away from the university. Elementary training in the remaining eight Ldnder is in the hands of independent Pddagogische Hochschulen, although closer association and even groupings of these independent institutions have been introduced, particularly in North Rhine Westphalia and Lower Saxony, in an attempt to upgrade their status. Indeed the status which should be given to the establishments for the training of elementary school teachers in West Germany has been and indeed still is a pivotal controversy. It is impossible to discuss training without reference to it and indeed many problems arise directly from it. The recruitment of staff; the selection of students; the prestige which they shall both enjoy, the content of the curriculum, the way in which subjects shall be studied, the reconciliation of theory and practice, the examination of them both, and of course the denominational basis of training; all of these and many more questions are directly related to the standing of the establishment where elementary teachers are trained and in particular whether this establishment shall be a university or university equivalent institution. For well over a century German elementary school teachers have consistently demanded that they should be trained at university and thus placed on a par with their colleagues in secondary schools. The prestige which Wilhelm von Humboldt gave to grammar school teachers and which was later won by all secondary teachers in Germany has been the aim and the purpose of elementary teachers. On several occasions these hopes have almost reached fruition, yet always in the final result failure or at most partial success has been attained. When for example the Weimar Constitution stipulated that, teacher education is to be unified throughout the realm on the same principles as apply generally